Wednesday, July 20, 2016

CASTLE OF FRANKENSTEIN NO. 3 (PART 1)


CASTLE OF FRANKENSTEIN
Vol. 1 No. 3

1963
Gothic Castle Publishing Company
Publisher: Calvin Thomas Beck (as Charles Foster Kane)
Editor: Larry Ivie
Cover: Larry Ivie
Pages: 68

One of Larry Ivie's better covers, a depiction of Tom Tyler as the titular character in Universal's THE MUMMY'S HAND introduces readers to CASTLE OF FRANKENSTEIN #3. This issue also marks the first time that the cover design added the distinctive filmstrip showing a preview of the inside contents in each frame.

Larry Ivie began his tenure in CoF #1 as Associate Editor. In the second issue he was billed as Managing Editor, and in issue #3 he has been bumped down to Assistant Editor, and Nicolas Morgan maintained Associate Editorship. "Charles Foster Kane" gave himself a promotion and moved up to Managing Editor and Publisher in this issue. Additionally, this was Bhob Stewart's first credit as Art Editor. Also of note is the content's page heading of "Frankenstein's Castle" instead of the magazine's official title. No reason is given, and it is quite possible it was either a quirk of Beck's or the staff was just experimenting.

The interior was an eclectic mix of material. The first installment of the Lon Chaney, Jr. bio, "Son of Chaney", by Richard Bojarski and John Cecchi, is found here, as well as a short discussion about Edison's FRANKENSTEIN which included the now famous photo from the cover of the EDISON KINETOGRAM. A young Don Glut is featured in "Teenage Monster Makers" and is accompanied by a number of photos from his amateur movies as a Monster Kid.
































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